Psychology & Buddhism.pdf

60 C. Peter Bankart
combination of Zen and self-control training in reducing fear, curbing drug abuse,
increasing empathy in counselors, decreasing generalized anxiety and test anxiety,
reducing blood pressure and improving coronary activity among coronary
rehabilitation patients.
By 1985 Jarrell could document over 1,000 published scientific papers on the
beneficial effects of meditation, including some that claimed that meditators were
less depressed, less anxious, less irritable, more self actualized, and significantly
happier. This was in line with the conclusions published by de Silva (1986) who
included much of what has just been listed, and added headaches, general tension,
fatigue, excessive self-blame, pathological bereavement reactions, separation
anxiety, and low frustration tolerance. As he had in his 1985 paper, de Silva paid
particular attention to describing the wide range of modern behavior therapy
techniques that can be extracted from traditional Buddhist practices.
Of course, there was a problem lurking behind most of these reports of the
phenomenal effectiveness of TM and related practices. That problem was that
most of the studies reported data from experienced TM participants, few of whom
manifested any evident psychopathology. Where were the control groups, the
double blinds, and all the other apparatus of carefully controlled Western science?
An answer was provided by Holmes (1984) who analyzed the data from 20 wellcontrolled
experimental studies published between 1976 and 1980 of the effects
of meditation on somatic arousal. The following is excerpted from Holmes’
abstract:
A summary of the research in which the somatic arousal of meditating subjects was
compared with the somatic arousal of resting subjects did not reveal any consistent
differences between meditating and resting subjects on measures of heart rate, electrodermal
activity, respiration rate, systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure,
skin temperature, oxygen consumption, EMG activity, blood flow, or various
biochemical factors. (p. 1)
Holmes reviewed a further four experimental studies that investigated the
effects of meditation on the anticipation of stress. These studies included diverse
control groups, including one that was called anti-meditation that had subject
exercise vigorously and think actively about their problems. Holmes’ conclusion:
“There is no evidence whatsoever that meditation facilitates the control of arousal
in threatening situations” (p. 8). He further concluded that there was no reason to
believe that there was any difference between the effectiveness of TM and any
other forms of meditation.
As one reviews the history of these studies several things become relatively
clear. There were (and probably are) real and substantial psychophysiological and
psychological benefits to be derived from a regular practice of meditation. These
benefits, however, are not really of a different kind or of a different magnitude
than those benefits that can be shown from a wide variety of similarly aimed